


The Feathered-Fangéd-Fawn

by KareliaSweet



Series: Storms [6]
Category: Hannibal (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Fantasy, Angst, Canon Typical Violence, Flashbacks, M/M, Monster Hunters, Monsters, Pining, Sexual Content, Soulmates, Violence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-02-03
Updated: 2017-02-03
Packaged: 2018-09-21 17:26:09
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 2
Words: 8,018
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9559580
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/KareliaSweet/pseuds/KareliaSweet
Summary: In his dream he walks with the wolf right to the cliff’s edge and they stare down. The drop to the ocean is very far and the roiling water beneath it looks like hungry mouths.The wolf presses its wet nose into Hannibal’s hand. Hannibal looks at it and its eyes are the same colour as the sea.“Kiss me,” the wolf says.“Always,” Hannibal replies.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> In the Eye of the Hurricane, Maelstrom, and beyond from Hannibal's perspective.

When Hannibal is five years old, he has a dream.

He dreams of a house by the sea. It sits on a high cliff, and there is a vast courtyard behind it, covered in scarlet clay. Hannibal walks onto the courtyard, and when his feet press into the soft clay it bleeds.

A wolf cub walks beside him and rubs its muzzle against Hannibal’s thigh. Hannibal strokes his small fingers through its fur. His mother told him he should be afraid of wolves, but he’s not afraid of this one. This wolf loves him. He doesn’t know how he knows this, but he knows it’s true.

In his dream he walks with the wolf right to the cliff’s edge and they stare down. The drop to the ocean is very far and the roiling water beneath it looks like hungry mouths.

The wolf presses its wet nose into Hannibal’s hand. Hannibal looks at it and its eyes are the same colour as the sea.

“Kiss me,” the wolf says.

“Always,” Hannibal replies.

The wolf opens its jaws and swallows him whole.

Young Hannibal wakes up with the taste of saltwater in his mouth, but the dream is forgotten.

-x-

Hannibal is currently in his favourite place, which is to say with his tongue buried deep between his beloved’s cheeks as he writhes and squirms beneath him.

“Please,” Will whimpers, “Hann-”

Hannibal just delves his tongue deeper and Will nearly screams, digging the heels of his hands into his eyes.

“Fuck. Fuck. _Fuck_.”

Hannibal laughs in his throat, the vibrations sinking into Will. He slips in a finger beside his tongue and presses upwards.

“Ah, God, I swear--”

Hannibal reaches up with his free hand and wraps it loosely around Will’s cock, flushed red and dripping. He gives him a few slick strokes before withdrawing and rubbing just his palm over the head in tight little circles. He keeps fucking Will with his tongue, pressing in with his fingers. His palm circles once, twice, three times and then Will is spurting over his hand, clenching around his tongue. Hannibal draws it out as long as he can until Will has to physically pull him away, dragging Hannibal up his body to give him a sloppy kiss.

“Well,” Will says, boneless and satiated, “that was fun.”

“Mmm.” Hannibal drags his fingers through the mess in Will’s stomach and licks them clean. “Have I ever told you how delicious you are?”

“Yes, but feel free to tell me ag--”

Their voices are cut off by a soft scritching at the bedroom door. Hannibal rolls onto his back with an exasperated sigh. Will chuckles and pushes himself up on his elbows.

“Everyone’s fine!” He yells. He turns to Hannibal. “What?”

“We are monsters, Will.”

“Yes, and?”

“Monsters do not have dogs.”

Will gives him one of his most masterfully stubborn expressions.

“These ones do.”

The scritching stops, and the sound of little footsteps pattering away makes Hannibal oddly thoughtful.

“Do you ever think of a family, my love?”

Will turns on his side and rests his face on his palm. His eyes are a beautiful royal blue in the dim evening light.

“For us?”

Hannibal nods.

“We have a family.”

Hannibal raises an eyebrow at him. “The dogs don’t count.”

Will gawps at him in overplayed offense. “Tell that to Winston’s face, I dare you.”

Hannibal hmphs at him.

“How are dogs different from having a family?” Will asks, half-laughing.

“You know how, Will. Children. Creatures like us. That is a very different thing indeed.”

Will seems to consider this, nibbling absently at the pad of his thumb.

“Do you think we would be good fathers?”

“Do you think we would not?”

Will doesn’t answer him, only rolls onto his back, leaving one palm open between them.  
“A son might be nice,” he says. Hannibal takes up his hand and kisses his knuckles.

“I’d always imagined a daughter.”

Hannibal feels the muscles in Will’s arm lock together from shoulder to fingertip, a tight line of tension.

“Let’s talk about this another time,” Will says. The tension drains out of him haltingly before he tugs Hannibal close. They lay silently together, hands roaming and claiming over plains of skin. Will’s fingers begin to slow their movements, resting on his favourite parts of Hannibal like bookmarks. Hannibal is certain he is asleep, until Will shifts his head a little so his lips are at Hannibal’s ear.

“I do want a family with you,” Will whispers quietly. It sounds like a desperate confession, like something gnarled and secret has been torn out of his body. Hannibal turns to look at him and Will’s eyes are wet. He kisses the corner of Hannibal’s mouth, rubs his thumb over Hannibal’s browbone.

“I do,” Will says again, and kisses him.

Hannibal sinks into it, rolling himself atop Will so he can deepen the kiss. He sucks at Will’s tongue, feels him stiffen against his stomach and hums approvingly. He pulls his mouth away to graze kisses across Will’s collarbone, his nipples, the downy line of hair on his belly, working lower until he gets his mouth around Will, hard and aching. Will’s fingers sink into his hair with just a hint of claw, and his hips undulate under the lovely wet suction. He comes over Hannibal’s tongue and Hannibal licks it up greedily. Then he clambers back up Will’s body to grind against his body and kiss him hungrily, all lips and tongue and nipping teeth. When Hannibal comes it is with a sigh and a shudder, and the evening’s conversation slips away, forgotten.

Almost.

-x-

Hannibal finds the fawn in the forest, shaded under a canopy and eating a midday meal. He knows there is something remarkable about her immediately, because she is not picking daintily at grass and flora, not at all. Instead, her nose is buried in the midsection of a twitching boy, who burbles as she chews on his liver. The fawn looks up at Hannibal’s human form and startles, sprung back on its haunches and ready to run.

“Wait!” Hannibal cries. He transforms into the Ravenstag. The fawn cocks her head curiously, and in turn lets herself morph into her human form. She looks remarkably like Mischa might have if she’d reached this age, with wide, pale eyes and long dark hair. The girl looks at him, her mouth bloody and raw. She licks her lips.

“Who are you?”

He isn’t sure if she’ll hear him, but the Ravenstag tries anyway.

 _My name is Hannibal_.

The girl’s eyes widen and she touches her fingers to her ear.

“How did you do that?”

Satisfied with his parlor trick, Hannibal resumes his form once again. He steps gingerly toward her. The boy has stopped burbling now, his eyes glassed over.

“Are you going to eat all that?”

The girl crosses her arms and gives him a cocky look. “No, but I won’t let it go to waste.”

She points at each part methodically. “The hair for sewing, the bones for stock, the fat for soap, and the meat - well,” she dabs at the corner of her mouth with a finger, “well, that’s meat.”

Hannibal grins delightedly. Where Mischa had been a little tornado, this girl is a tsunami.

“What is your name?”

“Abigail.”

“Abigail,” Hannibal says, “would you like to meet some more monsters?”

Will is not nearly as excited as Hannibal had expected him to be when he meets Abigail. He throws a petulant little fit that is decidedly out of character, and it isn’t until he confesses his past dealings with an Augur who had warned him against daughters that Hannibal understands.

Still, Hannibal has met Augurs before. They speak in riddles and cannot be trusted.

He convinces Will to let Abigail stay, not out of selfishness, but because he knows Will wants this as dearly as he does. They call Abigail back downstairs, resolved. Will lets the dogs in from outside and the friendliest of the bunch runs right to her.

“This is Winston,” Will says, “don’t eat him.”

Abigail rolls her eyes at him. “I don’t eat animals. Not the four-legged ones anyway.”

Will turns to Hannibal, begrudgingly impressed. “Okay, she can stay.”

Three years later, on a cool winter evening, Will tells him that everything is perfect. Hannibal thinks he couldn’t be happier. And in a way, he is right.

-x-

Abigail’s death doesn’t drive deep into his marrow the way that Mischa’s did. Instead, it is a constant pain, the pain of a thousand shallow knife cuts slicing over and over into his skin. It is the ever-present reminder that he could have done something to prevent this and did not. It is the knowledge that Will’s distance from him is immediate and overwhelming, a cruel amputation.

He keeps all of this tightly wound inside. His guilt is silent, because he does not deserve to mourn Abigail when her blood is on his hands.

When Mason captures them, for a moment he feels something that's almost like relief. Because Will is with him, and he will endure whatever torture is necessary to keep him alive - a penance paid twice over that might bring his beloved back to him. He bargains his life for Will’s and receives a last kiss for his efforts. He savours it even if the taste is bittersweet.

And then, as Will is led away, Mason orders his sister to kill the wolf too. The scream that Hannibal had been holding in rips out of him; lightning and thunder and rage all melded into an echoing howl.

Mason just laughs and begins to cut.

Hannibal waits for the inevitable slackening of the tether that ties Will to him, the sharp absence that will come when he is taken from this earth. He waits for hours, teeth gritted in preparation for the pain, but it never comes. Margot does not return. A tendril of hope, which had been so completely snuffed, begins to flicker in his gut.

Mason, unfortunately, takes out the agony of his sister’s betrayal on Hannibal with a variety of nasty tools. He tortures him for six days until hubris, inevitably, overtakes him. Thinking Hannibal sufficiently weakened, he frees him from his chains and pushes him to his hands and knees, his intent sickeningly clear. But Hannibal is not nearly as frail as he has made himself appear to be, and when Mason looms over him, Hannibal turns whip-fast and locks his wrists around Mason’s neck, pulling him down to tear off a chunk of his face with his teeth. Mason screams, and in the ensuing melee lands several deep gashes in Hannibal’s torso. He swings his knife wildly, squealing like a pig, until Hannibal lands a headbutt that sends Mason toppling backwards, twitching as he loses consciousness.

With the fresh wounds, it is harder for Hannibal to prolong Mason’s torture, especially since he refuses to eat him. Instead, he makes Mason eat his own face, slowly, and it isn’t until the seventh day that he finally lets him die. Hannibal doesn’t do it out of mercy, though Mason begs him, snotty and sniveling. He does it because he knows he has to find Will.

When he lays Mason’s body out in Firenze Square in the dim light of morning, his sister appears. He smells her before he sees her, a faint odor of rosemary and strawberries. She stands over him, expressionless. Hannibal pulls out Mason’s small intestine.

“You killed my daughter.”

“I saved her from a prolonged death,” Margot replies.

Hannibal shakes his head. “That sort of logic may have worked on Will, but don’t dare try it with me. You could have saved her if you’d chosen to grow your spine sooner.”

“Will is alive.”

Hannibal actually lets himself laugh, though it verges on hysteria. “I know that, Margot, he’s my fucking soulmate.”

She looks at him oddly, a mixture of surprise and disbelief.

“Yes, my dear, monsters can love.”

He finishes arranging the last of Mason’s entrails and wipes his hands on the cold stone beneath him.

“Since you spared Will’s life, I won’t kill you where you stand. But I do suggest you start running.”

He breathes in her scent once more, just so he can remember it when the day comes.

“I’ll give you the grace of a head start, Margot Verger. But never, _ever_ think you are safe.”

Margot nods once.

“Good bye, Wendigo.”

“That’s not my name.”

“I don’t care.”’

Years later, when Margot is cradling her wife’s broken body in her arms, she will wish that she had asked for his name.

-x-

_“What are you doing, my love?”_

_Will sits in the living room, his face twisted in violent concentration as he stitches together some pieces of mint green cloth._

_“I’m sewing Abigail an apron. She made things for us, I wanted to make her a gift in return.”_

_“Isn’t that rather… domestic?”_

_“She likes to cook.” Will looks up at him, picks out the needle from between his teeth. “Oh, or - are you jealous. Did you want me to sew you an apron too?”_

_He holds up the apron, its strings lopsided and the hems a charming mess. Hannibal shakes his head._

_“No, thank you.”_

_Will’s eyes crinkle. “I’m going to ignore the implied insult there.”_

_Hannibal laughs and makes a loose fist in Will’s hair, pulling his head back._

_“Never dream I would insult you, beloved.”_

_They kiss. Will, distracted, pricks his finger on the needle. He offers it up to Hannibal, who sucks the droplets away with a smile._

_Will gives her the apron the next day. Abigail’s eyes shine. In return, she gives them their new names._

_Papa Stag and Papa Wolf._

-x-

Without adequate food or tending to his wounds, it takes Hannibal six months to heal. Six long, painful months, during which Will’s scent grows fainter and fainter until it’s nothing but a memory. He moves silently from town to town, living off of animals and drunkards in back alleys. When he finally makes his way back to their home he finds it burned to the ground. He roams the charred halls, hoping for any sign of where Will may have gone next, but finds nothing. He searches the kitchen last, where he spies a scrap of something pale and green peeking out from underneath the oven.

He tucks it into his pocket and moves on.

He searches, fruitlessly, for another year, constantly moving, and always seemingly just out of reach. Every time he thinks he is close, every time he thinks he might be catching a hint of Will’s scent, glimpse a hint of his chestnut curls, he is met with a dead end. The frustration eats at him, chewing viciously on his insides until one evening he takes to the forest and howls at the stars until his throat bleeds. He collapses to the grass, weeping so badly it aches.

The Augur comes to him in a dream that night.

“Pull yourself together,” she says.

Hannibal looks down at his feet. There is no floor beneath him, only the vast endless midnight of the stars. The Augur plucks out one of the stars and holds it in her hand, illuminating the formless space between them.

“Where am I?” Hannibal asks.

Madame DuMaurier waves a hand in dismissal. “Don’t waste my time with stupid questions. What you should be asking is ‘where do you want to be’?”

The answer is immediate, budding on the tip of his tongue before his mind shapes the words.

“With my beloved.”

Bedelia nods. “Of course you do. Now how can you get to him?”

“I have tried,” Hannibal says, “I _am_ trying. Everywhere I seek I am ten steps behind. I can’t bear it!”

He balls his hands up into fists and screams into the void. The Augur steps toward him and slaps him across the face.

“Snap out of it,” she says. Hannibal’s eyes burn red and she smirks. “Don’t even try. I summoned you here, do you think you can hurt me?”

All the same, Hannibal’s fingers elongate into talons. The Augur opens her arms wide.

“Go ahead. Do it.”

He does not.

She gathers the starlight close to her breast and sits cross-legged on the emptiness beneath them. She gestures across from her, and Hannibal sits on… nothing.

“Now that you’ve had your tantrum,” she says, “here is what you must do.”

A small nebula floats past her nose and she flicks it out of the way.

“You cannot reach him. But perhaps he can reach you.”

“I’m sure he’s trying,” Hannibal says stiffly. He couldn’t imagine Will doing anything else.

The Augur rolls her eyes. “Of course he is. But you keep moving.”

She opens her palm flat and the star begins to gently wobble away.

“See?”

She reaches forward and pinches it between her fingers, then looks deeply into Hannibal’s eyes.

“ _Stop moving_.”

“But I must find him.”

“Let him find you. Your beloved is a monster hunter after all. Be a Monster. Show your face. And then--”

Hannibal curls his lip in distaste. “You want me to be _caught_?”

“I want you to be found.”

“Why?” Hannibal asks. “Why do you care about the fates of monsters?”

The Augur laughs an entirely mirthless laugh.

“I don’t. But the two of you being separated for so long goes against the natural order of things. Quite frankly,” she says, “it’s fucking up my work.”

She closes both hands around the hovering starlight and snuffs it out.

“Find a place, Hannibal. Stay there. He will come.”

“Where should I go?”

Her form is already starting to blur around the edges, melding with bits of the dazzling void.

“I’ve interfered enough,” her voice says, “you’ll know where. When the time comes.”

The Augur’s eyes turn black as she dissipates, folding into a galaxy that passes around her and carries her away.

Hannibal wakes with a start.

He returns to the last home he had, before Chesapeake, and he waits.

He waits for two months, killing only enough to survive. He exists in a frustrating limbo, not quite living but not yet ready for death. His skin begins to itch from keeping so still, and the neverending stasis makes him think it won’t be long before he goes completely mad.

Then the letter from the Captain comes.

 _My wife is gravely ill_ , the letter says, _and it is my hope you can save her_.

Hannibal snorts at this, but reads on. _You are a doctor of great renown, and come highly recommended. I was referred to you by Madame DuMaurier._

Hannibal’s fingers clench the paper hard.

_You will find my return address enclosed. Please consider my request. I will pay any fee._

_Yours in good faith,_  
_Captain Jack Crawford._

Hannibal has his bags packed and is on the road before nightfall.


	2. Chapter 2

The moment Hannibal meets Bella Crawford, he knows two things. First, he does not want to kill her. Second, she is most certainly going to die.

He finds Baltmoor an adequate place to settle. Still he does his best. He begins to befriend the townspeople, the ones he can stand, and makes himself known as a cultured and respectable man. Captain Crawford introduces them to their resident doctor, a very capable woman named Alana Bloom. She rakes her eyes across his body when they are introduced, and it does not go unnoticed.

“I am glad to be among such good company,” Hannibal tells her. “The last doctor I worked with was not nearly so beautiful.”

He says that last part just to see if he can make her blush, and he does. She presses the back of her hand to her cheek and quietly excuses herself.

“Careful, Doctor Lecter,” Jack chuckles, “she’s married.”

Hannibal masterfully resists from rolling his eyes.

“I may flirt from time to time, but I assure you it is entirely innocent,” Hannibal says, instead of _I’m only charming you idiots so I can kill your neighbours without suspicion_.

Quietly he begins killing the townspeople. Only the rude ones first, the ones that won’t be mourned when their bodies are found. The first few are groundwork, simple kills that will build hushed alarm instead of instant hysteria. After that he begins to get inventive. Tableaus and sculptures designed to intrigue as well as horrify. A corrupt judge is left in the courthouse with his eyes plucked and his brain scooped out, weighing heavy in the bronze scales he holds in his stiff hands. _Justice is Blind_. That sort of thing. It's simple, Hannibal knows that, but without Will to add his paintbrush none of these kills can be a great work of art. It feels empty making these designs without him, unfinished, but Hannibal knows there is an end to his means. There must be evidence of a monster before it presents itself, after all.

 

Rumours of said monster in their midst begin to rise. The conversations usually go something like this:

 _‘Did you hear?’_  
_‘Who now?’_  
_‘It was the cello instructor. Strung up like his own instrument.’_  
_‘What monster is behind this?’_  
_‘They say it’s Dr. Gideon. That he broke free from the madhouse to take his revenge.’_  
_‘Nonsense. This is a real monster. Look at the bodies.’_  
_‘It’s not natural, what it does to them.’_  
_‘Whatever ‘it’ is.’_  
_‘I wonder who’s next.’_

Even though gossip is exceedingly rude, Hannibal leaves the rumourmongers alone. They’re useful after all.

He throws absurdly lavish dinner parties for his new friends, relishing in the knowledge that they are often digesting the very topic of conversation. Jack brings Bella, who is consistently the most delightful guest at his table. Dr. Bloom never brings her wife.

“She doesn’t like to leave the house,” Alana says, “perhaps you could join us for dinner once?”

Hannibal smiles at her graciously.

“I would be delighted.”

It is hard to kill Bella Crawford, so in the end, he does not. She is a brilliant flame of a woman and it is not in his nature to snuff out such a thing, but suffering is beginning to drown her. A small flicker of sympathy begins to lick at his insides. At his last visit to her he leaves four times the amount of morphine than he should at her bedside. She watches with tired eyes as he sets them down.

“Thank you,” she whispers.

“I have done nothing but give you a choice.”

He leaves her with a kiss to her forehead, and a hope that he already knows is extinguished.

Captain Crawford calls him to the house the next day. Hannibal pronounces her dead and stands silently at her bedside while Jack weeps.

“I am sorry for your loss,” he says, and means it completely.

He visits Alana that afternoon.

“You had suggested dinner with your wife.”

Alana nods. “Yes,” she says, “not tonight. Jack, well--”

“Of course,” Hannibal agrees. “Perhaps tomorrow? I find myself in need of company.”

He is, that much is true, but the sympathetic look that Alana sends his way makes his stomach twist in regret at his request.

“I understand. I’m sure it’s hard to be alone. With Bella gone, and that awful monster - it's vile, the things it does. Disgusting.”

Hannibal swallows his bile. He nods curtly in noncommittal agreement.

“Tomorrow would be lovely,” Alana tells him sweetly. She places a hand on his arm and Hannibal smiles through the unwelcome touch.

“Thank you. I will bring my best wine.”

-x-

_“Papas! Dinner’s ready.”_

_Abigail lays out the meal with a satisfied smirk; juicy roasted loin with thyme and Braeburn apples, and a spring salad with radishes that is mostly for decoration. Winston trots to the end of the table, quietly panting as he politely waits for scraps. Abigail holds out a small piece of meat she'd tucked into her apron pocket._

_"Say please."_

_Winston barks once. Abigail tosses him the meat and he catches it, jaws smacking happily._

_"No more until after dinner," Abigail tells him gently. Winston lies down with his head on his paws and licks his chops. Hannibal does not miss the absolutely adoring look Will gives her as they sit at the table._

_They let Abigail serve them, her lopsided apron tied neatly around her waist. Hannibal tilts his head to look at it closely. Something is different._

_“Abigail? What's that on your apron?”_

_Abigail smiles, a small secret thing. She holds up the edge for Will and Hannibal to see._

_“It’s, um, us. See?” She points at each part of the design. “There’s the fawn, me, and the Wolf’s teeth, and the Ravenstag’s feathers.” She ducks her head a little bashfully. “I hope you don’t mind.”_

_Hannibal and Will look at each other with identical expressions of misty affection. Will reaches across the table to clasp her hand._

_“Of course I don’t mind. You made us a family crest.”_

_“The Feathered-Fangéd-Fawn,” Hannibal says. “It’s beautiful.”_

-x-

Alana opens the door with a gentle smile and greets Hannibal with a kiss on both cheeks.

“Hannibal, I’m so glad you’re here. Won’t you come in?”

He hands her a bottle of Mourvèdre and crosses the threshold. She thanks him and gestures him into the parlor.

“My wife will be down momentarily,” she says, “she’s very excited to meet you.”

“As am I,” Hannibal replies smoothly. “Anyone who has managed to capture your heart must be an exceptional creature indeed.”

Alana’s light flush blooms into a deep scarlet and she stammers.

“Darling,” calls a voice from the next room, “is he here already?”

Hannibal’s eyes narrow for just a hair of a second. Something stirs in his memory. The voice sounds very familiar.

Alana turns to greet her wife, obscuring her face in the doorway as she hands her the bottle of wine. Hannibal catches a glimpse of dark hair, the edge of a full mouth. He inhales deeply and smells rosemary and…. strawberries.

 _Oh_.

This makes things so much easier.

“I finally get to meet the famous Dr. Hannibal Lecter,” the voice says, “I’ve heard so much about you.”

Alana steps aside to let her wife through, and Hannibal can’t help but smile with all his teeth.

“Hannibal, this is my wife Margot.”

The bottle drops from Margot’s nerveless fingers and splits open on the floor. Shards of glass scatter and Margot's face turns chalk-white. Hannibal’s smile turns very monstrous indeed.

“It appears your head start is over, Miss Verger.”

Wine creeps across the floorboards like a blood stain as Margot stares at him in horror. Alana touches her arm in concern.

“What’s the matter?”

“It’s him.” Margot’s voice trembles. “He’s the monster!”

Alana turns to Hannibal and shakes her head feebly, but Hannibal can already see in her eyes that she knows it is true.

“It can’t be. He’s -- he’s a good man.”

Hannibal advances on them slowly. “I can promise you I am neither of those things.”

Margot grabs the broken neck of the wine bottle from the floor and points it at him. “Don’t you dare come closer.”

Hannibal dares. Alana stands frozen rigid between them. Margot waves the bottle again, and in one frighteningly swift movement Hannibal grabs Alana by the arm, tugging her towards him and swinging her toward the open window of the parlor. Before Margot can scream, he pushes Alana out. She falls without making a sound.

Margot rushes to the window, and as she does Hannibal disarms her of the bottle. He holds it under her chin as she silently trembles.

“Be a dear and call Jack, will you?”

He drops the broken glass at her feet and walks out into the night.

Hannibal waits patiently in his foyer for Jack to arrive. When he hears the knock, he opens his door with a smile.

“Hello, Captain. I’ve been expecting you.”

Jack’s face is thunderous, but more than that, it is lined deeply with betrayal.

“You’re lucky Alana’s alive.”

“It’s hardly luck. I didn’t intend to kill her. She will live, she might have a limp, but I hear such things add character.”

“You killed my wife.”

Hannibal shakes his head. “I offered her a choice. She took it. I do regret her death. Bella was a remarkable woman.”

Jack rears back and punches Hannibal in the jaw. “You don’t get to say her name.”

Hannibal spits blood from his mouth and grimaces. Jack pounces.

They fight. Jack is a force to be reckoned with, and Hannibal matches him - careful to keep his full strength in check because, loathe as he is to admit it, this is a fight he has to lose. Hannibal lets the brawl go on as long as he can, until Jack has him bloodied and bruised and on his knees.

“Tell me why I shouldn’t kill you right now,” Jack spits.

Even though it hurts in this condition, Hannibal transforms into the Wendigo.

“Tell me you know how to kill me,” he replies.

Jack snarls and grabs a metal sculpture of a stag from the entryway table.

“I’ll find someone who does,” he says, and knocks Hannibal out cold.

Hannibal wakes up in a dismal little cell. He looks up to see a nervous-looking man with sandy hair standing guard over him.

Hannibal looks him up and down, unimpressed. “This is the best they could do?”

The guard quivers. Hannibal eats him.

They send another guard after that, with wavy dark hair and a permanent scowl. He reminds Hannibal of Will just enough to piss him off, so he eats him too.

He eats two more guards before they move Hannibal to a smaller cell, one further down the dungeon that will keep him behind two heavily locked and bolted doors.

“The Monster Hunter is on his way,” Jack tells him through the iron grate. Hannibal feels the first stirrings of hope in his chest.

-x-

_“How can Papa Wolf be a monster hunter when he is a monster?”_

_Hannibal looks up from his book. Abigail is frowning at him from across the kitchen counter as she chops kidney into cubes. Hannibal folds a finger into his book and sets it in his lap._

_“Because all monsters must hunt.”_

_“Will he hunt me when I’m grown up, then?”_

_“No,” Hannibal says fiercely, “You are our daughter Abigail.”_

_Abigail shrugs and keeps chopping. “He killed my first Papa.”_

_Hannibal sets his book aside and joins her in the kitchen. He takes up another kidney and begins cutting in the same quick, sure rhythm._

_“Your first Papa was not good to you.”_

_“No.”_

_“We are good to you.”_

_Abigail pauses with her knife and looks up at Hannibal with pure devotion._

_“Yes.”_

_Hannibal sets his own knife down and gently straightens the shoulder of her apron._

_“We hunt the monsters that would not be good to us. And the people, too. May I share with you a secret?”_

_Abigail leans toward him and nods._

_“There are people that are far worse than monsters.”_

_Abigail rolls her eyes. “I know that, Papa Stag.”_

_Hannibal cups her face fiercely between his palms. “You do not. Pray you never meet them. They are who we protect you from.”_

_For a moment there is a genuine spark of fear in her eyes, but she blinks it away in an instant. Very little can scare their child these days. Hannibal takes his hands away and holds up the corner of her apron, their crest stretched out between them._

_“We need to hide who we are so that our family can survive,” Hannibal tells her, “and no one would think a monster hunter to be a monster. Better to hide in plain sight, yes?”_

_Abigail considers this. She runs her finger along the neatly sewn feathers. “I think I understand now. Papa Wolf hunts the monsters so that the monsters can hunt?”_

_Hannibal smiles. Such a clever girl, their daughter._

_“Yes. He would never hurt you. Nor would I. As long as Will is the Fearsome Dragon Slayer, we are safe.”_

_Abigail nods and returns to dicing the meat. “Good.” She looks up at him with a bright smile. “Pass the carrots?”_

-x-

They starve Hannibal for a week. Every day Jack comes to his cell and sneers at him.

“The Dragon Slayer is coming,” he says.

Every day Hannibal smiles back at him drily through the bars.

“I look forward to it.”

The day Will comes, Hannibal smells him before he sees him. He smells exactly as Hannibal remembered, like earth and spice and copper, vibrant and tantalizing. Just the hint of his beloved being so close after all this time fills him to the brim with elation. Still, he knows they are not out of the woods yet, and he must play his part well.

When Will enters his cell, the sheer beauty of him makes Hannibal vibrate with need, but he tamps it down. Will looks at him with a clever mask of disdain. Hannibal sees right through it, sees the raw need and relief that floats just beneath, unseen by anyone but him. It is the hardest thing in the world for him to not kiss Will breathless then and there.

When Will says, "Hello, Hannibal," his voice velvet-dark, Hannibal nearly combusts.

Will's methods are simple. He insists on Hannibal being nothing but a madman, though they both know that to be far from the truth. He fights insolently with Jack, who remains steadfast, insisting that Hannibal cannot be human. He's right, and Hannibal tells him so, which makes Will order him to shut up (Hannibal can't help needling him, he's always loved it - Will secretly has too - and it's been _so long_ ). Even as Will denies the fundamental truth of what Hannibal is, there is still - just beneath his gaze - a fierce and beating love that is trying desperately to claw its way out.

 _I found you_ , Will's eyes say, _My monster_ _, I found you_.

Then he looks away, focusing on Jack, and Hannibal knows it is because if Will looks at him again they will not be able to stop themselves.

"Five minutes," Will asks, "then I'll know if he's a monster or not."

Jack leaves not a moment too soon. Will grabs his monster and kisses him so perfectly that Hannibal could weep for it.

They clutch and paw at each other, reclaiming lost territory between hands and mouths. Will grabs him by the neck and presses their foreheads so tight together Hannibal thinks they might meld into one creature. He doesn't mind.

“You will not leave me again,” Will says.

It sounds like an order, but Hannibal knows it is a plea, knows that this barren loneliness has been suffered equally. He clasps Will's neck in return and makes a vow.

"Never."

They barely make a plan. It’s not Will’s style. All Hannibal knows is that blood is in the water and it smells divine. They transform into their respective forms together and it's just like coming home.

When the Captain re-enters the cell Will dives first, slashing Jack’s throat with his claws. Hannibal lowers his antlers and charges, landing a glancing blow to Jack's side. Jack falls, unmoving. Will climbs on the Ravenstag’s back and together they run. Alana is at the doorway to the prison, her eyes wide at the sight of both of them in their monstrous forms.

“ _No_.”

Will runs his claws through Hannibal’s mane.

“You’ve already hurt her. Do we kill her?”

_She is married to Margot Verger._

Will inhales sharply. “We hurt her, then.”

He climbs off Hannibal’s back and walks slowly toward Alana, who is shaking like a leaf.

“Your wife killed my daughter,” Will says, “a sixteen-year-old child. She cut her throat. Ask her about that when you go home tonight. Tell her that monsters showed mercy where your wife did not.”

Alana bursts into tears. Will swings back atop Hannibal and grabs hold of his antlers.

“Head north,” he says. They run.

They don’t even make it to the safehouse before Will cries for him to stop. Hannibal knows what he needs, what they both need, and they find an abandoned schoolhouse, its facade brown and crumbling. Hannibal transforms again without needing to be asked. Will drags them inside and shoves him up against a hallway, where they rut against each other, biting and nipping, their faces streaked with blood. Will spills over Hannibal’s fingers with a rough yell, his fangs sinking into Hannibal’s flesh in consummation.

They hold each other for a moment, and Will kisses him with red lips.

“God, Hannibal,” he says, “I ached for you.”

The safehouse Will has prepared is expansive, overlooking the ocean. The courtyard stings strangely at the back of Hannibal's memory, but before he can explore it, Will is drawing him into the house. Will tugs him toward the bathroom, stripping him as he goes. His hands are everywhere at once, murmurings of affection falling from his mouth like strings of pearls. Hannibal lets Will draw him a bath, where Will tends to him lovingly until the touch becomes too much for him to bear and he turns to crowd Will against the edge of the tub, laughing into his mouth as water runs over the sides. They push and slide together, slick and wanting, and Will comes mid-kiss, Hannibal chasing it. They nuzzle against each other until the water begins to cool, and Hannibal gives Will a gentle push. Will just grumbles in reply, snuggling closer. Hannibal sighs and relents, taking up one of Will’s arms and kissing the bones of his wrist, licking and sucking all the way down to the inside of his elbow. Will makes a very agreeable sound, and then quite suddenly he barks.

Hannibal freezes. That sound didn’t come from Will. Will looks up at him chagrined and Hannibal sighs.

“You brought the dogs.”

“I brought _a_ dog.” Will holds up a finger. “One dog. One.”

They get out of the tub and dry themselves, and Will takes Hannibal to the guest room, where sure enough, Winston is waiting happily for them both, his tongue lolling out.

“You are ridiculous,” Hannibal says fondly as he pats Winston’s head.

“Which one of us are you talking to?”

Hannibal doesn’t even look up. “Both.”

They go to bed and make love once more, and this time it is violent and blood-soaked and terribly beautiful.

Hannibal walks out into the courtyard that night and breathes in the salt of the sea. Abigail slips her hand in his and Hannibal squeezes it tight.

“Papa Stag? What is this place?”

Hannibal bends to grasp her shoulders, looks deeply into her wide eyes. “Do you remember how we got here?”

“Yes.”

“Keep that memory. Lock it safe away. If we are ever separated, this is where you must go.”

“Oh, Papa,” Abigail says sadly, “I wish you had told me that when I was alive.”

Hannibal watches as a jagged line draws across her neck, splits open and bleeds. Abigail doesn’t gasp, doesn’t struggle, just smiles with deep regret as she tumbles backward off the cliff. He watches as she falls into the sea, one arm stretched towards him.

Hannibal wakes mid-yell with Will looming over him, concern drawn tight across his face.

“What happened?”

Hannibal doesn’t reply. He clambers out of bed and runs to where they had pooled their filthy clothes on the bathroom floor. He reaches in the pocket of his crumpled trousers and pulls out the apron scrap, clenching it tight in his hand. He rocks back on his heels and exhales in relief. Will sits on the floor behind him and hugs his shoulders. Hannibal opens his hand and Will makes a soft sound of surprise.

“Where did you find that?”

“Our home was burned. I found it in the ashes.”

Will kisses his shoulder. “She left it for us.”

“I was a good father.”

“Yes. You were.”

Will holds him for a while until Hannibal gets up and lets Will lead him back to bed. Will wraps himself around Hannibal’s body, mouth pressed to Hannibal’s neck, one leg slung between his and a hand pressed over his heart.

-x-

They stay in the safehouse for a month until Will makes a journey to the market for supplies. When he comes back his face is pale.

“Jack Crawford survived,” Will says, “he’s assembling an army.”

This, they both know, is different. Until now, they’d never been linked together. Monster and Monster Hunter. Wolf and Stag. They should have killed Alana and Margot. They should have torn Jack to pieces. They were cocky in the euphoria of their reunion, and now they must suffer the consequences.

Hannibal takes Will by the shoulders and kisses him hard.

“Then we fight.”

They could run, they both know this. But of all the homes they have shared, this one gives them the best battleground, the gaping maw of the sea stretched out behind it. They prepare the house accordingly, stripping it of any possible weapon that can be wielded against them. Winston watches them anxiously and whines in his throat.

“You know what will happen if we keep him here,” Hannibal says softly. Will looks away.

That night, Will walks Winston the five miles down the road to the nearest village, Hannibal following silently behind. With tears in his eyes, Will ties Winston’s leash to a lamppost in the square, close enough to a fountain so that he can easily drink. Hannibal looks away, giving him respectful distance as Will kneels to say goodbye.

“Be a good boy,” he says. Winston whimpers.

Hannibal waits until they’re a mile clear of the square before pulling Will into his arms. Will collapses against him.

“He will find a home,” Hannibal says.

Will weeps into his chest. “I hate how human I feel right now.”

Hannibal tilts Will’s chin up with his finger. “Love is not singular to their species. Nor is sorrow. You have brought me both, and I am still a monster.”

“You’re my monster,” Will says.

They kiss. Will’s hands clench tight over Hannibal’s shoulders.

“Come,” Hannibal says, “let’s go home.”

They make love that night, quietly and with passion. Hannibal lays back as Will works him open with deft fingers, kissing the crests of his hips and the soft skin of his inner thigh. He has four fingers buried deep when Hannibal pulls at his hair, hard enough to sting.

“Now, please.”

Will has stretched and slicked him so thoroughly that he slides inside him with gorgeous ease. He sighs and kisses Hannibal as he thrusts all the way to the hilt, cupping Hannibal’s face between his hands and murmuring breathless wonder into his mouth.

“This has never changed for me, this moment,” Will says. “When we join, it’s like--” he rears back and thrusts in again, “God, it’s like worlds colliding.”

“Like universes collapsing,” Hannibal replies.

“Like everything is dust and ash, except for this.”

“Except for us.”

Will pumps into him in long, measured strokes, and Hannibal can feel the fullness, the weight of it. Will, strong and thick inside him, touching places beyond his bones, stirring starlight in his blackened veins.

“I love you, Hannibal," he gasps, "Hannibal _,_   _kiss me_.”

“ _Always_.”

Hannibal crushes their mouths together, licking Will’s teeth to encourage his fangs and then cutting his tongue so that blood runs between their lips. Will’s mouth opens on a cry between them and his hips stutter as he spills into Hannibal. Hannibal coaxes him through it, clenching around him as he whispers Will’s name.

Then Will pulls out of him, dipping his fingers into the mess that leaks from Hannibal and using it to slick up Hannibal’s cock. Hannibal is on the verge of orgasm when Will squeezes him at the base.

“Not yet. Inside me.”

Will slips two fingers into himself, scissoring them perfunctorily before he adds a third, and with a hiss he withdraws them, straddling Hannibal and lowering himself onto his cock. Hannibal growls and Will snarls in reply. His beloved has always preferred his fucking on the rough side. Hannibal flips them, throwing Will’s legs over his shoulders and pounding into him. It doesn’t take long, Will having already worked him up so thoroughly. He comes with his own sharp teeth bared, burying a bloody kiss in Will’s throat.

“When they come for us, we will kill them,” Will murmurs, “every last one.”

Hannibal cages him in his arms and nods in solemn agreement.

“I won’t let them take this from me,” Will vows, “I won’t.”

-x-

True to his word, Captain Crawford brings an army to their door. Word has spread like a plague from town to town, and the victims and survivors of the newly minted 'Monster Husbands' seek vengeance with the foaming fury of the righteous. They arrive at sundown, fifty men armed to to the teeth with Captain Crawford leading the charge. Hannibal and Will are ready.

The battle is bloody, and horrendous. Will takes a knife deep in his shoulder, Hannibal a club to his face. But they fight back. They snarl and rip and slash and tear. They fight together as they always have, lovingly, violently, in perfect and awful synchrony. Those that are lucky get thrown into the sea. Those that are not feel the kiss of a fang, the bite of a claw. Limbs are torn and strewn about like chopped logs, firewood that will never burn. The courtyard smears out with red until it becomes a pool, dark and shimmering in the moonlight.

When all is done, they stand over the body of Jack Crawford. They decided to leave him whole, as a sign of respect.

“He was brave. I almost regret killing him,” Will says, his chest heaving.

“We did what must be done.”

“The world will be after us now. There’s no running from this.”

Hannibal shakes his head in agreement. “No.”

“So what do we do?”

Hannibal takes him by the hand, interlacing their fingers and leading him to the cliff’s edge. He stares into Will’s eyes. They look silver as they catch the light of the stars. He takes up Will’s left hand and draws a bloody circle around his fourth finger.

“Will Graham. Under this moon, I take you to be my husband.”

Will says nothing for a long moment, just drinks Hannibal in, his expression a lovely mingle of surprise and adoration. He takes up Hannibal’s left hand, dips his own right finger into the weeping wound on his shoulder, then draws a circle around Hannibal’s fourth finger.

“Hannibal Lecter. Under this moon, I take you to be my husband.”

They smile at each other. Will breaks their gaze first with a watery laugh.

“I was told I would never marry.”

“Not under the eyes of God, perhaps. But you are my husband all the same.”

“As you are mine.”

Hannibal slips a hand into his pocket and pulls out the worn-down scrap of apron. He holds it out to Will. Will takes it, running his fingers over the little stitched teeth of the fawn. It looks fitting, stained with the blood from both their hands. The last piece of her design. Their eyes meet, and as one they hold out the Feathered-Fangéd-Fawn to the ocean. An offering for their marriage. A sacrifice for their bloodshed.

“Goodbye, Abigail,” Will says.

They let her go.

Hannibal sighs in a great heavy shudder, tears edging stubbornly at his eyes. Will steps into him, close enough to brush their noses together.

“Kiss me.”

“Always.”

They kiss three times. First, reverently, to seal their union. Second, joyfully, to celebrate their violent love. Third, sorrowfully, to mourn their uncertain future. Their lips linger together on the last, arms wound tight around each other as the cold wind blows in from the sea. Will buries his face in Hannibal’s shoulder, and Hannibal rests his head atop his.

“This is not the end,” Hannibal says. He curls his fingers into Will’s shirt. Will’s sad smile burns into his chest.

“I love you, my monster.”

Together, they fall.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay, so. This is how their story ends. BUT. Two things.
> 
> 1) I felt strongly about ending this here, but I did write a coda to it if you find yourself unsatisfied. It's posted [here on tumblr](http://lovecrimevariations.tumblr.com/private/156770902070/tumblr_oksc9fQKgs1ug45hc) if you want to read it. It does not change the ending, but if you find yourself wanting a little extra it's there for you. (If anyone does choose to read, please let me know in the comments if the link works. I set it to private to avoid unintentional spoilers for others)
> 
> 2) There is still a final epilogue, from the perspective of our favourite Augur. Look for that to be posted Saturday.
> 
> As always, thank you so much for reading, commenting, kudo-ing and being great people. I appreciate you more than you know!

**Author's Note:**

> As always, comments and kudos are love! I've been horribly sick all week so this has been sustaining me!


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